Hiya everyone! Here we go moving on onto the next chapter! As always I fully admit that I do not have nor do I claim any rights to anything Marvel! With that out of the way, you can now proceed to the next bit! Enjoy! Xoxo-NickyLynn
Tessa startled awake from a particularly bad dream, not having realized she had fallen asleep in the first place. She pushed herself up from the desk she was still sitting at, having passed out at sometime after going at it all night and well into the next day. She rubbed her tired eyes, trying to clear up her hazy vision as she pulled herself out of her slumber. "Where are we at with the simulations J.A.R.V.I.S.?" Tessa asked out loud, having let the A.I. run through the possibilities while she rested.
"All twenty-nine sequences have been run and none are viable options for counteracting the palladium levels." Came the response.
"Shit." Tessa sighed, looking over the results for herself. The truth was, Tessa was very nearly out of ideas. She didn't know what else to try. All at once she felt another minute closer to midnight and the reality that she could very well fail Tony began to fill her. A loud crashing and booming sound could be heard above her, startling her out of her spiraling thoughts. "What was that?" she asked the A.I. then, coming to a stand.
"Mr. Stark's birthday is currently being celebrated. He seems to be entertaining the crowd. He is in the Iron Man suit." J.A.R.V.I.S. informed her. Tessa had nearly forgotten about the celebration. She truthfully thought that Pepper would have managed to talk him out of it, as it was a foolish thing to do considering everything happening. But of course, Tony had been Tony and pushed forward with the party. Tessa was upset that he would rather party with a bunch of people who didn't even care about him, than rest like he should have been doing. But she could have lived with that. What she couldn't tolerate was him pushing the limits by continuing to use the suit. He knew it only increased the palladium levels coursing through his system. He knew it was killing him faster, but apparently that hadn't stopped him. And Tessa was pissed.
She stormed upstairs, the loud music getting louder and louder with each step. As she made it to the main level, she had to push her way through masses of strangers, everyone inebriated, loud and screaming out in excitement. Tony, being the absolute idiot he was, was standing above the crowd, with a microphone in his hand drunkenly falling over himself as he tried to incite the crowd further.
She caught sight of Pepper and Rhodey standing in the crowd and strode over to them as Tony demonstrated for the masses how to urinate in the Iron Man suit. She came to a stop next to Pepper's side, arms crossed and livid. "Oh, I would highly suggest intervening in this before I do." Tessa told Pepper. "Because I can guarantee he won't like what happens if I do." She said, just barely keeping her anger in check.
Pepper looked from Tessa back up to Tony. "I know. I'll handle it." She responded before making her way through the crowd, up to where Tony was standing.
Tessa watched as Pepper took the microphone from Tony's grip and, with tact that Tessa currently lacked, calmy tried to bring the party to an end. Tony for his part, was acting the drunken fool, leaning all over Pepper and trying to kiss her.
"This is ridiculous." Rhodey said next to Tessa, causing her to bring her angry eyes over to him, and as she did, she found the same anger shining through his. Tessa bit her tongue and swung her eyes back to the front of the crowd where Tony was insisting that the party wasn't over.
Tony took the microphone back in his hands, striding forward through the crowd. "She's right. The party's over." He told his guests, who let out moans of disproval. "Though, the party was over for me like an hour and half ago….the after party starts now! And if anybody doesn't like it, there's the door." He said casting a hand behind him, a blast from the stabilizer on his hand sending out a burst of energy, causing the glass walls he was pointing at to shatter.
Tessa, and the entire crowd, jumped in alarm at the sound of the blast. But, unlike the crowd, she didn't start clapping and yelling in excitement. No, instead the grip on her arms tightened and her finger nails dug into her flesh. She could feel the muscles within her shaking as they tried to keep control over the powers that threatened to bubble out in her fury. She watched as Tony let out a roar to the crowd, feeling empowered by the blast. Her eyes locked with Pepper's panicked ones briefly before someone in the crowd through a wine bottle into the air and Tony blasted it out of the air in a rain of alcohol and glass.
"I'm done!" Rhodey seethed next to her. "I stuck my neck out for this guy, and he's using the Iron Man weapon as entertainment?! Nope, done." He said, shaking his head and pushing his way back through the crowd as more people began throwing things into the air for Tony to destroy.
Tessa was done too. She opened the lid on her powers, transporting herself in front of the crowd next to Tony. She sent a burst of power into the speaker system behind her, causing it to explode into a shower of sparks as the music came to an abrupt halt. She heard the crowd gasp and as she swung back around to face them. She knew with her unnatural glow and hardened eyes, they knew she was dangerous. The crowd went silent as she stood over them, shaking in anger. "I'm only going to say this once…..get out. NOW!" she ordered.
The crowd didn't need to be told twice, as they began running out of the room in fear. Tessa swung around to face Tony, and the look on his face said it all. He knew he had fucked up. He knew what he did was wrong, but yet he had done it anyways. "Of all the stupid, reckless things you have done!" she began, tearing into him. "Do you want to die?! Because I think you do! I'm down there working my ass off trying to save you and all I asked was for you to do one thing for me! All you had to do was rest! TIME, TONY! I just needed some time, and do you know how much you just took from me!? Wasting it on what?! Using the suit as fucking party trick?!" she bellowed, furious that he could have done something this insulting.
"You don't deserve to wear one of these." Came Rhodey's voice then. Tessa and Tony turned to find the original silver-designed Iron Man suit standing in the doorway, Rhodey inside. "Shut it down!" he ordered, striding into the room.
"Get out of my suit." Tony responded; his voice low.
"I said….SHUT. IT. DOWN." Rhodey said again, closing the distance in between the two.
"And I said…" he began before sending a blast out at Rhodey's chest, sending him flying through the wall behind him. "Get out of my suit." He repeated as his face plate snapped down. He made his way towards the hole Rhodey had just disappeared through, into the gym.
"Oh, I can not handle this right now." Tessa groaned out as she heard the clashing of metal on metal as Tony and Rhodey duked it out. She transported herself through the house, set on finding Pepper. She found her downstairs on the main level of the house, where the guests who had risked staying had congregated in the small kitchen area.
Everyone gave her startled looks as she appeared in the room. Tessa ignored their looks as she strode across the room to Pepper. "What's going on? Did you stop him?" Pepper asked, having heard the sounds of loud crashing echoing through the house.
"Not exactly." She admitted as she came to a stop next to her and Natalie. She shared a look with the agent for a moment before continuing. "Rhodey has one of the other suits." She explained before cracking could be heard and the men in question fell through the ceiling, landing in the middle of the room in a mess of crumbled debris. "And, well, you can guess how well that's gone over." She finished as she watched the two men stand back up and face each other again.
Tessa grabbed hold of Pepper and transported her away from the two fighting men, knowing they neither of them were concerned with collateral damage at the moment. Pepper looked over at Tessa with wide eyes as they landed near the crowd of people gawking through the glass window from outside. They watched as the two men struck blow after blow against each other, destroying the house as they continued their brawl. After Tony slammed Rhodey down into a counter, smashing it under the weight, sending water spraying out everywhere, Tony looked back over at the watching spectators, letting out a ferocious roar. Everyone but Pepper, Happy and Tessa took off running, fearing for their lives.
Rhodey grabbed hold of the sink as he stood back up and brought it down onto Tony, sending him flying into the fireplace burning in the wall. A burst of flames flickered into the air above Tony as he pushed himself out of the wall, turning and raising his arm out towards Rhodey, as Rhodey did the same. Not having patience for anymore, Tessa transported herself back into the room, landing in between the two men. "OKAY, ENOUGH!" she yelled, looking from Rhodey to Tony.
"We don't have to do this Tony." Rhodey said from behind her, still holding his hand up.
"You wanna be the War Machine so bad, come on, take the shot!" Tony told him, refusing to drop his hand as well.
"Put it down!" Rhodey yelled out.
"Both of you put it down!" Tessa yelled out as their hands began to glow with power. "Alright, that's it!" she roared, reaching down inside her and latching onto her power. She pulled back on the door she kept it caged behind and let the power burst from her in an uncontrolled blast that expanded around her like a bomb. The blast sent the two men flying in opposite directions and the glass walls of the room exploding out in a cascade of broken shards.
As the light from the blast faded, Tessa looked around the damaged room. Her eyes first fell on Rhodey, who was pushing himself out of the rubble. "This is over." She told him sternly as he came to a stand. "Take the suit…do whatever you have to do….just leave." She commanded. Her eyes then swung over to Tony was who still lay on the ground, propped up against the wall she had sent him flying into. The eye slots of his suit flickered back into power, and he lifted his head to look at her as Rhodey silently strode outside and took off into the sky, taking the suit with him. Tessa looked at Tony and she couldn't help but feel so….disappointed. "I expected better from you." She told him with a remorseful shake of her head. "I hope you enjoyed your party, Anthony. Now if you excuse me, I have to get back to trying to save the life you seem so adamant to throw away." She bit out before disappearing from the room.
Tessa left the mansion and drove herself back to her apartment. While she lacked the tech and resources that Tony had available, there was one thing her apartment offered that the workshop in Tony's basement didn't-solitude. She went to her apartment and sat in the silence. And as she sat there, with nothing but the sound of her heartbeat keeping her company, she broke down. She felt the brick walls she had built to help keep herself from falling apart crumble away into nothing as the tears began to fall. She cried. She cried because she didn't know what to do. She cried because she didn't know how to save Tony. She cried because she didn't want to lose Tony. She cried because she was terrified to be left alone….again.
By the next day, her tears had stopped, but the darkness in her chest hadn't dissipated in the slightest. She was running through simulations on her laptop, feeling drained and empty, when her phone rang. Her eyes flitted over to the screen to see Tony's face. She let out a sigh, before reaching over and flipping it open. "You better not be calling to apologize, because honestly I just don't think I can even handle that right now." Tessa said, forgoing a proper greeting.
"Uh-well…I-I mean that was what I was going to lead with, but-" Tony said, stumbling over his words at her curtness.
"What do you want Tony? I'm busy." She told him bluntly.
"I need a favor." He said then.
Tessa rolled her eyes. "You mean other than trying to stop your impending death?"
"It coincides with that actually." Tony responded. "I think I found the answer." He told her, causing her to freeze.
"What?" she asked in disbelief. "How?!"
"Look, it's complicated but I think my dad left me the answer." Tony explained.
"Howard?" Tessa asked, confused.
"Yeah, you know the plans for the last Stark Expo he was creating?" he asked her.
"Yeah, I think so, why?" she asked, not understanding what the expo had to do with this.
"I need the models from Stark Industries. They were pulled out of storage to be displayed at this year's expo, but they were never put out. They should still be in the main office. I need them." He told her. "I would do it, but I'm kinda on house arrest."
"House arrest?" she asked, the confusion growing even more with each sentence that came out of Tony's mouth. "Tony, what-" she began before he cut her off.
"I'll explain when you get here. See you soon." He said before the line went silent.
Tessa looked down at her phone in bewilderment for a moment, processing the previous conversation. She shook her head, snapping the phone closed, before getting up from the couch and making her way towards the door. She didn't understand what Howard's models had to do with anything, but if Tony thought they would help solve this riddle, then so be it. She grabbed her keys before walking out and heading towards Stark Industries.
An hour later Tessa was walking back into the mansion, the large pieces of the model floating in the air behind her. The house was still in shambles, so Tessa had to carefully step around the piles of broken glass, drywall, and concrete as she pushed further through the house. She paused as she rounded a corner, a familiar face coming into view. "Hello again Agent Coulson." She greeted.
"Ms. Rogers." He greeted back as Tony came up the steps from the workshop.
"So, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s the one who's got you under house arrest?" she asked Tony.
"Well, we had an agreement to uphold to." Phil said seriously.
"I'm honestly not sure how keeping Tony under lock and key falls under the terms of our agreement." She told him. "And I'm not sure what these models have to do with anything." She then said, directing the last part at Tony.
"Wait, what agreement?" Tony asked, ignoring her query.
"It doesn't matter. Can someone please explain to me what I'm doing with this damn thing!" she said, motioning towards the pieces of the model she still had hovering in the air.
"Bring them down to the lab and I'll show you." Tony told her. So, with no other choice, she followed Tony down the stairs, bringing along the model with her. Once they were down in the workshop, Tessa carefully dropped the pieces down on the table Tony had cleared off. They moved the pieces together until they locked back into place as one large piece.
"Okay, I still don't understand what Howard's expo plans have to do with any of this." She reiterated.
"Jarvis, could you kindly Vac-U-Form a digital wire frame? I need a manipulatable projection." Tony said, causing the A.I. to scan the model. The entire model began to glow with artificial light as the system laid out a digital copy of it.
"Nineteen seventy-four Stark Expo model scan complete, sir." J.A.R.V.I.S. responded after a moment.
Tony lifted his hands over the model, lifting the projection up into the air. He turned with it in his hold before laying it out before him, twisting the view so that they were looking at it from an arial view. Tony crossed his arms, looking over at Tessa. "What's that look like to you?" he asked her.
Tessa looked at the image, studying it. At first, all she seen was the same old thing she saw every other time she looked at it. A map to an Expo that never happened. But she let herself look beyond that and really looked at it. She took a step back, analyzing it with a tilt of her head and suddenly it clicked. The image before her bared a remarkable resemblance to something that she had become all too familiar with. "Holy shit." She whispered, in amazement. "It's not a map to an expo….it's a map of an atom." She said in astonishment, looking over at Tony with wide eyes.
"In which case, the nucleus would be here." Tony said, stepping forward and pointing at the center of the image, where a globe was displayed as the center display for the supposed Stark Expo. "Highlight the Unisphere." He told J.A.R.V.I.S., who responded by enlarging the image. Tony studied the image for a moment. "Loose the footpaths." He then ordered and J.A.R.V.I.S. let them disappear from view.
"Tony….this can't be, I mean…do you really think-" she began, finding it hard to believe that Howard had kept something like this from her. Though, he had never shared everything with her, and she knew that.
"That my dad discovered a new element and hid it in his model? That's exactually what I think." He responded, before turning his attention back to the image. "Loose the landscaping, the shrubbery and the trees." He ordered and J.A.R.V.I.S. took those away as well. "The parking lots, entrances, exits." He continued, flicking through and deleting all the unnecessary items.
When all that remained were the main buildings and structures, Tony had J.A.R.V.I.S. restructure the image, using the pavilions as the framework. J.A.R.V.I.S. complied, condensing the image down into a single atomic structure. With a clap and extension of his hands, Tony blew the image up until it surrounded them in a bubble of blue light.
Tessa looked around at the projection around her in astonishment. She let out a scoff of disbelief. She looked around at the structure of the previously unknown element, wondering how Tony had known. "Tony, how did you know this was here?" She asked, finally looking over at him.
"Dad told me." He responded, causing Tessa's eyebrows to lower. "He left me a message in a video." She then said in explanation. "Dead for almost twenty years and he's still taking me to school."
"J.A.R.V.I.S. can you run this in simulation?" Tessa said, looking back around at the element surrounding them.
"Simulation complete. The element should serve as a viable replacement for the palladium core." Came his response after a moment.
Tessa let out a breath that she had been holding for far too long. The tears burned in her eyes as she let hope begin the fill the darkness that had begun to consume her. She let the tears of joy fall from her eyes as she realized that this was the answer she had been looking for. "This is it!" She said, stepping forward and pulling Tony into a hug. She was filled with so much happiness that she couldn't help but hold him in relief. Tony let her hold onto him, as he held onto her just as tight. A wide smile was stretched out across his face as he finally let himself believe that he could be saved.
Tessa pulled back after a minute, looking around at the element one last time. "Thank you, Howard." She whispered, amazed that it had been Howard who had managed to save his son, even from beyond the grave.
Tony clapped his hands, bringing the projection back down into a small sphere that fit into the palm of his hand. "Well, what do you say, want to help me make a new element?" he asked her with a raise of his brow.
She smiled over at him, relishing in the feeling of being able to actually smile again. "Sounds like fun."